In all fairness, someone who isn't too good at pleasing either herself or her partner can usually learn the skills involved. I've been an eager student and teacher at various times in my life. All of them pretty happy times.

And I don't care about how my pre-marital sex affects the probability of divorce because I don't want to be married. It's not a deal that I will accept, cash for.. no, I'm not going to use that degrading word just to make a rhyme.

I just finished reading "Sons and Lovers" by D.H. Lawrence, written about a century ago and considered very modern, avant-garde and feminist in its time. It was not in any way "shocking" (as his "Lady Chatterly's Lover" was considered), but more like his "Women in Love," which questioned whether any one model of marriage was right for everyone.

I read those other two books about the time I started University, and they were a thoughtful introduction to how women might face issues of their own desires - without being as limited to purely practical matters as, say, Jane Austen. I had no sisters, and being about two years younger than most of my schoolmates at a time when girls mature sooner than men made it hard to get to know females in elementary or high school. And, yes, I do realize that D.H. Lawrence is not a woman, but he was a good observer and writer of human experience.

So "Sons and Lovers" was a revisit to what I saw a half-century ago - and it brought back to me the disaster that was my parents' marriage, and those of the parents of everyone I knew, and later virtually all my schoolmates who married within a year of graduation. The only people I know today who have had long-term marriages that worked either married later or were on their second or third try. When I read the book, the average age of first marriage was 19, and now it's more than a decade later, so perhaps we've all learned something as women increasingly demanded control over their own lives, and hence education, before marriage or child-rearing.

Lawrence describes a woman married to a fairly despicable brute of a coal miner, and how her second son bonds with her deeply in her tragedy and efforts to make the family work for her and his siblings. He comes to know two women; one hopes for a seemingly traditional marriage where two people share everything and belong completely to each other (Lawrence calls this "a nation of two" in "Women in Love"); the other is a married woman who has left her husband and espoused feminism and independence. In the book's somewhat abrupt but hopeful conclusion, the protagonist decides he doesn't have to accept either option and goes forth to see what else life can offer him, or he can wrest from it.

The ever-wise Charlie Brown (penned by a family-devoted Catholic George Schultz) said it best for me: "Love is what you make it." I say, cut your own deal. One size does not fit all.

So, if you want to remain a virgin until you find a like-minded person, go ahead. It can't be that much harder than trying to find someone who doesn't want to marry.ED BEAR

One more thought: I knew a man who dated widely and often. His mantra was to get the passion and steamy stuff going quickly. He figured that getting to know someone was just giving time for negative things to be noticed that might be ignored by someone already committed and hormonally craving. :)ED BEAR

Butterchickenchuck: Your Axe collection would make me wonder why you just didn't test-sniff the various fragrances in the store.

Aintnodeal: "AN OFFICER AND A GENTLEMAN" really disgusted me. Here were a couple of cynical women looking to "trap" a Naval Officer, and we're supposed to be happy when it works? Both guys were idiots and born victims. The film was propaganda for accepting stereotypes of marriage as the only correct life to live, like all those stories about how horrible marriage (or childbearing) is that end with the protagonist falling into what they knew was a dungeon. ("Keep the Aspidistra Flying" comes to mind...)

Everyone has the right to seek what they want. I find nothing wrong with wanting to share sex, not have it sold to me by someone who doesn't want or like it - a recipe for having to pay, pay and pay for grudging, loveless sex for a long, miserable time. I don't put any time limits on dating leading to skin contact, but I am very happy to have close female friends, most of whom would not consider me as a lover. One doesn't expect to have to give anything for friendship other than friendship, and I feel the same way about cuddling, kissing, making out and sex. And about helping a buddy with mechanical repairs and fix-it projects. :)ED BEAR

The weird thing is that the women I know who got so many military scams is one who said she'd NEVER consider dating a soldier. She said she felt that military self-selection and training made for horrible people. Then the first scammer hit her, and said that his joining the military was the worst mistake he'd made in his life, and she took pity on him. Until he asked her to cash a draft and send her an iPhone.ED BEAR

The ones that make me roll my eyes are the ones that say, "Just message me and ask me," and then - if you DO ask - launch into a tirade about how the heck did I think someone like them would ever want to hear from someone like me? They had lots to read about me and make their decisions on, but what did I know about them?ED BEAR

The bitumen intended for Canadian West Coast export by pipeline simply diluted, not upgraded, tar sands oil. (I use "tar sands" rather than "oil sands" because, as a 63-year-old Canadian, I never saw the latter until just a decade ago, when the propaganda wars began.)

"Flaring" natural gas - burning it at the wellhead - releases ALL the hydrogen sulfide immediately. Canadian energy companies are rapidly advancing plans to collect and sell liquefied natural gas, and building a major LNG seaport.

It is true that conventional oil production in Canada has had to scrub H2S; this is much more difficult with diluted bitumen. I don't know how anyone can remove CO2 from oil because it doesn't contain any - the CO2 is created in the combustion of the product. CO2 capture at major combustion sites is possible, but not in the multitude of small engines and sea diesels.

None of that affects my ranking of the shipping options. Let me first stress that I DO NOT SUPPORT SENDING BITUMEN TO SEA FROM WEST COAST PORTS.

I DO live near an oil pipeline: the existing half-century-old Kinder Morgan Trans-Mountain Pipeline. And it has one of the best safety records in the world - in fact, the first significant spill (other than small puddles at pumping stations under repair or upgrading) was in July 2007, when a residential contractor dug into a line. It was in a suburban neighbourhood and, as the workers were not pipeline workers, they failed to report and contain quickly. The result was a massive oil geyser and a toxic mess in city streets and homes.

Kinder Morgan spent $15 million on the cleanup and was also fined $1000 for its share of the responsibility. It was ordered to add another $149K to an environmental fund; the company also contributed another $100K to contractor education workshops. We see about a dozen ads a day on TV warning people to "Call before you dig." And they've been on the air regularly as long as I can remember. And I can remember the Beatles.

Other than that, Trans-mountain's history is excellent: they summarize it at www.transmountain.com/spill-historyAll the facts therein easily checked out with other sources.

Kinder Morgan expansion (twinning the pipeline with a larger one, tripling capacity) has advantages over the Norther Gateway route:- the right of-way is already negotiated- the right-of-way already has access roads and monitoring/remediation stations- there are a lot more people around the southern route, so things could not go unnoticed very long compared to the north- loading tankers in Burnaby (rather than on the wild north coast) is safer, and there are more resources to deal with things in an urban area- ships in the Vancouver area use a minimum of three tugs, whereas the northern route would allow only two- politicians and the public are sure as hell going to be maximally motivated to prevent corner-cutting in the province's biggest city and tourist trap

Still, that's only relative to the Northern Gateway route. The Keystone XL route, over land, with the current best practices AND NO SLEAZY CROOKED OVERSIGHT, should be the safest option. Whether you want to just try to stop all oil production is your choice, but doesn't change my opinion on safety ranking.

I'd focus more on stopping regulatory corruption and corner-cutting, and less on imagining an oil-free world will happen instantly.

Hence, the prospect of Trump approving Keystone XL - from this Canadian's viewpoint - is not a worry. There's a LOT more to worry about in Trumplandia.ED BEAR

When Barak Obama was first elected to the presidency, Trump tweeted that America should rise up in a massive march on Washington.

Pence helping out with policy is not surprising; Trump isn't interested in it much. Recall how one of those approached by the Trump team to run as VP said they were told they were to handle domestic and foreign policy while Trump concentrated on Making America Great Again. Presumably (and that's just a presumption) by just being such a Fantastic Figurehead.

Good analogy, there - Bush and Cheney.

I urge you all to check out the last two weeks' articles on Snopes.com, the fact-checkers of record on-line. There's a good deal of valuable background on US politics and its functions. One item , in particular, documents how the Electoral College system was designed in part to PREVENT charismatic demagogues from sweeping the country. That's also why only a third of the Senate can change at any election"

>>High-ground: Huh? I don't hear an outpouring of vulgarity from Canada. Certainly nothing to compare with what's being tossed around south of the border. You may have noticed that our Prime Minister made not a single partisan remark about the US election, and has been welcoming and friendly to the new electee, despite significant policy differences.

Speech fees? Bill and Hillary Clinton, and their foundation, were extremely successful throughout the Dubya years, when they had no input to national policy, even before Hillary ran for senate. Former presidents usually raise money with speechifying. And in Clinton's case, he HAD to raise money to pay all the post-impeachment legal bills he left office with.

>>razors_edge55: There are specific laws requiring all correspondence and records of certain elected offices - most notably presidents - be preserved. That's why it is not permitted to do public business on non-governmental accounts; at the time Bill Clinton set up his server (which was when he left office and thus all his government E-mail) it was much more secure to have one's own server than to risk the insecurity of public ones like Gmail (which reads all posts and prohibits all encryption). Virtually all political workers used Blackberry systems for work at the time, but many used insecure iPhones for personal communications because they were "cool" toys.

In the early years when E-mail was becoming the bulk of government business, many (if not most government) employees were struggling with separating work and personal business. None of them were prosecuted. Nobody has been prosecuted in any case where "malign intent" was not alleged. This has not been alleged in Hillary's case - just sloppiness.

Now, Podesta is not a government employee. He works for the Democratic Party. He has a right and expectation of privacy in his correspondence, and could conceivably prosecute for its violation. Same applies to Wasserman-Schultz.

>>Personally, though not a Trump admirer, I think saying he'd urged "the second-amendment people" to shoot his opponent is over-reaching. It's much more likely he meant the NRA and similar lobbying groups, who had considerable money and organization, would target Clinton with money and lawyers, not guns.

>>On the "Witch-Hunt" possibility after a Trump victory: The president does not have the authority to order the Attorney-General to appoint a special prosecutor, or do anything else. The Judiciary is independent of the Executive branch; all the President can tell the A-G is to take or leave office.

Certainly, a Giuliani A-G's office might go after Clinton, but that would be a real waste of time and focus, and reflect badly on Trump's administration, given that the issues would me moot. AND the charges are so flimsy.

Note that in fact Clinton has NEVER suggested that, if elected, her administration would start to paper Trump with nuisance charges. If she wanted to...

Donald Trump, dozens of national press cameras on him, blatantly violated the secrecy of the ballot by leaning over to watch his wife Melania mark her ballot. This is a serious crime - like tweeting your ballot - because it allows vote-buyers and vote-coercers to verify that their "vote zombie" has done as ordered. In Melania's case, this is significant, given that Melania (like Trump himself) was a long-time Democratic supporter.

How many women have blithely let their husbands believe they have obeyed voting orders while voting their own consciences? That's their right, and why secrecy of the ballot is so precious.

I see now that one of Trump's sons did the same to his own wife.

From vox.com: "The Associated Press recently combed through the laws in all 50 states relating to the legality of taking a selfie in the voting booth. In 21 US states (and Washington, DC), it is perfectly legal to take a photo with a ballot. In at least 16 other states, it is explicitly illegal — and can earn you a fine or EVEN JAIL TIME." [Emphasis mine - EB]

In New York, you can get a year in jail.

Should they now be hounded to death over these "high crimes"? None of the Democrats have said so.

It's all academic in the case of Hillary Clinton. Past Presidents have a long-standing tradition of pardoning people who might be subject to politically-motivated perpetual legal harassment. In fact, Giuliani has already spoken out demanding that Obama not do so. Tough, Rudy, that's the rules.ED BEAR

The Keystone XL pipeline, by my (BC_based) estimation, the least of the evils. If you don't want to see any oil being used at all immediately, opposing it's a no-brainer.

But unlike the Kinder Morgan, Northern Gateway or Energy East proposals, Keystone XL will not put diluted bitumen - which is pretty much impossible to recover after a spill because it sinks - on the oceans. And it will replace miles of tanker trains which would carry the oil less safely and at greater cost; not building Keystone XL will not stop the oil from moving.

And selling Alberta and BC tar sands product - which is very high-sulfur - into the states would see it cleaned up to US standards. Shipping it out to China would see it burned with all its sulphur AND in a place where the prevailing winds would carry it back to the North American west coast.

The technology for very safe pipelines and monitoring, as well as safe routing, exists and has worked extremely well. The legislative will to enforce it is possible.ED BEAR

Qatar is everything you say, but Al-Jazeera is, for all its faults, the closest thing the Arab world has had to a free news service. And, as I acknowledged, the Emir's instructions allowed freedom to report on everything except him and his own country.

Interesting... up here in BC, Canada, when dealing with auto repairs, you'll often be given a quote and then, when the shop finds out it's not covered by insurance, cut the quote in half. There are so few shops here compared to my home province of Quebec that they simply don't compete and slag the insurance companies for all they can get. The official policy is for the government insurer (which covers everyone for core liability but leaves the rest of the market open) to accept paying 15% more for repairs than the open market.

When it comes to health care in the USA, the cross-ownership of drug companies, medical suppliers, HMOs and insurers often sees cost being inflated because they are paying themselves. And exempt from what remains of the anti-competition laws.ED BEAR$160 a month for a family's full medical in BC if they have no low-income adjustment - but it never goes up for those earning more than $30K so it's a very regressive tax. No copay, no limits. Drug plan is separate and depends on province too: in BC we have an income-dependent minimum we pay ourselves; a range where we pay a copay; and if over the maximum we pay NONE of the overage, not all as in the US.

One thing I have used to prove my existence is a photo of myself sitting in front of a computer screen showing my correspondent's last message. It's possible that I could have called someone in, quickly, for a photo shoot, but at least it proves I'm not using a photo off the internet or elsewhere.

I've only once demanded reciprocity, and that was from a blatant fraud who vanished immediately.ED BEAR

As I read it, the Russians were bombing lots of things, but the hospital attacks were carried out by Syrian government (Assad) forces, not Russian ones.

The Russians have stepped in to crush hard military targets, but the Assad forces have been doing the most publicly abusive things. Putin knows who to leave standing looking criminal, and Assad doesn't care what anyone thinks of him at this point.

In general Al-Jazeera is considered the most independent and fair news source in the Arab world. I know that might be criticized as faint praise, but journalists all over are impressed by what the Emir of Qatar has done: he created a news organization, got the best journalists he could find, and told them they could do and say whatever they wanted as long as they didn't criticize him or Qatar.

Most people in Arab countries were used to government-controlled media they had no trust in. AJ isn't perfect, but it's been a first light for people seriously under-served in accessing information.

My favourite Russian joke, from a book of Soviet-era political cartoons, showed a pair of armed soldiers standing in the snow beside a stopped car with the driver's face visible in his open window; one solider was holding a little book in his hands and speaking the caption: "Why are your papers in order?"

In Russian, "Pravda" means "Truth"; "Izvestia" means "News." In the Soviet era, a truism used as often as we use "It ain't the heat, it's the humidity!" played off the fact that the Communist Party newspaper, full of ideology, was called PRAVDA, and the leading government-controlled newspaper was called IZVESTIA:

Sugar, things may have changed - but at least the last time I looked you had a couple of weeks to change your username, age and a few other key items. The idea was to allow error correction or second thoughts about age lies. :)

If you worry about what the "for" and "intent" may be interpreted as, say more in your "About Me." Like, you seek a stable, exclusive relationship but aren't in a hurry, so you want to start slowly.ED BEAR

I've messaged people - with a disclaimer acknowledging that I wasn't pitching them - who have embarrassingly funny errors in their profiles, like the woman who described herself as having "a big heat," or obviously unintended ambiguities or contradictions. Most were amused and I had some interesting conversations, and one woman even messaged me back two years after leaving PoF and then deciding to try again.

I have also at times messaged (with disclaimer) persons whose profiles indicated they misunderstood some PoF features, in the manner of trying to be helpful to newbies. Usually with friendly thanks, sometimes with further conversation.

On rare occasions, I have warned people that an image might cause them problems, too.ED BEAR

This is an old, dead thread, but I think ladyc4 had it right. The dude was telling everyone in the office he was still available. He was more than happy to do the bouncy-bouncy with short&sassy, but didn't want to chase anyone else away.ED BEAR

Seriously, has anyone really found ANY reason to call Hillary Clinton "crooked" or "corrupt" other than the fact that her opponents keep throwing those labels at her? Has anyone found anything that can be backed up to justify those sobriquets?

The best summary of the "E-mail scandal" I've found, after cross-checking dozens of others, is at

www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/11/4/13500018/clinton-email-scandal-bullsh*t (You'll have to replace that asterisk)

The author, Matthew Yglesias, call out Clinton on several notes, but there's simply no "there" there.

On the other hand, Trump has never pretended to be anything but a selfish, greedy bully - he prides himself on it.

Compare assorted charity-checker reports on the Clinton Global Foundation and on the Trump Foundation - which he stopped giving money to, and which funnels much of its money back to him. Similarly, much of his campaign spending goes to interests he owns.ED BEAR

Let's not forget that,for a large proportion of the population, being wanted physically is very attractive. I've been turfed for acting too respectful of women who had told me they didn't want to get physical yet. In one case, respecting a wall of pillows in the bed between us. In the window the morning came, out the door I went...

In another case, when I started to talk about where we were going - intending to talk about what we wanted and what our hopes and fears were after three dates, the last one being a long ride to Vancouver Island and back - the poor woman almost started crying because she figured I was going to Dear Jane her in person. I figured sitting on the bike for long periods was enough physical contact for us that early.

(She was happy, we had a nice night out at a play her daughter was in, and we dated for about two months before she told me I wouldn't do. Lots of smooching and heavy petting, but...)ED BEAR

Ooh, IReallyShouldn't - I love that idea! Thank whoever came up with it for me!

Alas, as I've only ever gotten one spamscam, I don't see being able to use it any time soon. :(

Of course, they usually have burner E-mail addresses (just like the ones we use to reply to them) so there's no point siccing someone else on them.

Finale: I sent the scammer a photo of myself sitting in front of a computer screen clearly displaying "her" most recent message (with all identifying information either cropped out or GIMPed over), and asked her to do the same. I got a one-paragraph reply saying it was so sad that I was such a jerk and trying to "mess with her head."

All they had to do was send a new photo that wasn't taken from PoF and I'd have been nice and happy to find a real person; I've used this method in the past to reassure people who wondered if I was really the person they were looking at. I recommend it, but be careful of what's on the screen. And, of course, save the shot without its EXIF meta-data or identifying comments; any photo editor can do this. Usually, it's in the SAVE AS options.ED BEAR

Hey, I just got my first romance scam proposition! I was feeling so unloved, with so many women I know telling me how much fun they had trolling scammers!

This lady used old, recognizable profile photos from PoF, and said she lived in Nanaimo but worked at Vancouver General Hospital - three hours and a ferry ride each way unless you can afford the helijet service. Oh, and of course she is on a temporary assignment in Cape Town but will be coming back soon and is dying to meet me. And her profile vanished from PoF the minute she got an E-mail from one of my burner accounts.

She's just asked me to phone her at a Nanaimo number, which she says she roams to the Republic of South Africa. Gonna have to go pop that balloon; when I log off, I'll send her a photo of myself in front of a screen showing her E-mail sent yesterday. And ask her for a new one of her. :)ED BEAR(And yes, I do purge photo meta-data and make sure there's nothing revealing on the screen.)

Nobody really knows what, if anything, Cinnamon Hitler would do if he became president. All he seems to care about is winning, and he shows no interest at all in being anything other than a figurehead. His being president is the sum total of what he thinks will Make America Great Again.

That, and his tendency to select advisors from his own employees and from the ranks of those he wants to put the blocks to, make the guidance of his executive staff an open question. And, let's face it, he's made a lot of enemies in Congress and done absolutely zero to create working relationships there.

He's not likely to get a lot of what he wants done - but then he doesn't seem very aware of what he wants.

I lived a block from the old Montreal Forum (hockey temple) for many years back in Montreal, and saw a heck of a lot of great bands there, and at other Montreal venues. It was a great place. All the touring performers, from Reddington to Lennon, would always tell each other that it was THE town to do in Canada if you were going there at all.

I've spent many an evening comparing rock-show creds with pals for no apparent reason - heck, it's better than bonding by fighting until you're both bleeding wrecks like they do in the roadhouses! I even saw Jorma Kaukonen (ex-Jefferson Airplane - damn, just checked and I can still spell his name properly! one night when I was passing though Boulder, Colorado. Fantastic show! The Stones were in town the same night, but what the hey, I'd seen them three times already!

The most recent big show I've caught here in Vancouver, BC, was Bruce Springsteen. He only did half the four-hour show I saw back in Montreal, and the sound was muddy, but he's still looking a lot younger than I while I'm really younger than him.

Come to think of it, a lot of folks tell me I look wayyy younger than I am - a cop once tried to tell me that couldn't be my driver's license - but I don't see the ladies lining up to get to know me. No accounting for taste, eh?ED BEAR

One of the most offensive choices made by former PoF BigFish was to program it to enforce two hoary stereotypes: that all women want men taller and wealthier than themselves.

That's why have proudly kept my account income-level-free, though it's meant I haven't been able to edit my profile for years. BigFish tried to enforce income revelation with that restriction. It's also why I keep my decade-old account active, just out of bloody-mindedness. :)

Try knocking off the requirement for a degree, though, and see how many new faces appear. Higher education is actually not very common in PoF listings. Perhaps because it's a free site, and elitist types with lots of money would rather go pay for a more rarified selection.

Joke's on them - "rarified" means thinner/sparser. So you get fewer people. No need to rarify your candidate base too much!

Everybody has the right to be offended by whatever they feel offends them.

Nobody, in a free country, gets to impose that on other people.

Majority rule does not mean majority tyranny; that's why constitutions protect minorities. Democracy does not mean 51% of the population ganging up on the other 49%, killing them and taking all their stuff.

This is what so many people miss in the distinction between hate speech and offensive speech: hate speech, or racist speech, incites harm or discrimination.

Offensive speech must be constitutionally protected; anyone can say whatever they want offends them, but they must not gain license to silence anyone they arbitrarily label offensive.

That's why I think there's no merit in complaints of "cultural appropriation." It's a completely subjective self-declared offensiveness. Similarly, not all dressing as a member of another race (in the arts or in fun dress-up) is automatically offensive just because the old blackface musicals portrayed blacks as dumb, dirty monsters.

Do the Cincinnati Indians' name (and sports teams choose admirable fighters for their icons - there are no "Drunken Irishmen," though there are "Fightin' Irishmen," and nobody thinks it is calling them street brawlers) and trademarks offend people? Some. They have every right to use the name (the "Chief Wahoo" logo is stretching it, but then the Vikings, Sharks, Canucks and other teams have some pretty silly logos), BUT, as a public business, they need to recognize that offending people will repel business.

Atlanta "Braves" is certainly not derogatory in any way. Now, "Redskins" is starting to get offensive, but is it inciting hatred? The McGill University varsity teams (my Alma Mater) are traditionally called Redmen, but that's because of their team uniform color; nothing in their tradition or semiotics* has ever evoked native traditions, and that's probably why one does not hear a lot of complaints about it. After all, the British were Redcoats. (Not Red-Noses!)

Similarly, dressing up as the pope or disrespecting the prophet may offend some world-conquering religious empire-builders, but they have to legal authority to enforce that in countries with freedom of religion. There are still a few "blasphemy" laws on the books here and there, but they never survive attempts to enforce them.

Nobody gets to call transgender/transsexual/newgender people "disgusting" in any way that can cause any institution to crap on them or kick them out. PoF is not up-to-date in gender terminology, but to its credit it has always allowed Men to Seek Men and Women to Seek Women along with the more common preferences. It can get really complicated beyond that, and I think that it does make sense for people to be as clear as possible in their profiles; I have seen a great many that did a good, calm, non-threatening job of that.

So if anyone finds once-male persons calling themselves female disgusting... tough. Be nice about it. You don't need to make any more enemies in this world.

It seems that most of us aren't disgusted, and while nothing is likely to move match DOT com to invest in re-programming PoF with new gender options, let's not be ducks about what offends us. Sure, you can say it. Why would you want to?

ED BEAR

To hades with "normal." The best things, by definition, can never be "normal."

* Semiotics is the study of symbols and iconography. In Ron Howard's film "The DaVinci Code," he labels Tom Hanks' character a professor of "symbology" because his test audiences didn't know what "semiotics" meant. Now you do. I just love learning things.

It's all about thinking that popular or idiosyncratic ideas of "normal" matter. I've heard women discussing men say, "He's never been married. There must be something wrong with him."

Only to women who want a man to marry, I guess.

As far as "Single," goes, I'm with the crew who say it means never married. If there are check-boxes for "divorced," "separated," "widowed" and the like, the meaning should be obvious. The "virgin" analogy works for me.ED BEAR

I agree that beards are a turn-off, but then I'm a guy. I am at a loss to comprehend the surging popularity of "stupid-stubble" beards among men. Why do men think beards are great? I know one guy who sys his beard hides his chinlessness, and two who say it hides thier massive jowls, but beyond that...

80/20 is the sort of silly statistic that Donald Trump loves. Even Hillary Clinton fell afoul of "half of Trump's supporters," using a common phrase for "part of" that becomes a fantastatistic. (My portmanteau coinage for "fantasy statistic.")

It's like "Sturgeon's law": "ninety percent of everything is crap." Though I remembered it as "86% of everything is crap." The point is that generalizations are no made any more correct or precise by sticking BS numbers on them.ED BEAR

These target women much more often than men. Men seem more culturally alert to being looked at as ATMs.

But it's not like there are no red flags: POF says it right up front, and often: "If anyone asks you for money, it's a scam."

Warnings:

-don't loan money-don't order things for people (foreign cheques can come back after months!)-don't take a check and refund money on it-use a reverse image search to find out who else claims to be that photo-don't stick around when offered business opportunities or get-rich-quick scams-don't go to any website you get pointed to to communicate, or download any software someone asks you to.(especially web addresses ending in a code number, like thatsite.domain/WX34J!kk882 - that means they're getting a commission for sending you there!)

"Understanding women" is always a problem if you treat women as another species. Not having any sisters, I have always valued the friendship of women, and found many unforseen benefits.

For one thing, it helps one be comfortable with women, and recognizing things that can scare or upset them in ways men don't always realize.

For another, one can learn how the women one knows feel about responding to overtures they receive. And women can tell you when they think other women are liking you - or not. they may even identify women who they think are suitable for you, and even say nice thing about you. Keep in mind that all women are different, and not all women know what all other women think and feel.

Some people do want a father-figure in their lives, or help raising and caring for a child. Nothing wrong with that.

Human children really DO need support when growing. And there's no excuse for cutting off support - it's the children who need support, and it's not their fault.

For myself - at the age of 63 now - I don't want to live with, raise or have a child. As such, I would be reluctant to date a pregnant woman. I don't feel bad about that; women and children who want a male parent shouldn't end up with people who don't want to be parents. It's a recipe for misery for all.

And what of the kids with no supporters? We know that parentless, institutional upbringing is devastating, not to mention that parents who love and support their kids do all they can to give them an advantage over other kids - special tutors, educational materials, and the socially-destructive plague of private schools. That unfair desire to put one's first is a big part of why I don't want to be a parent - I don't think I could ever accept being unfair to the world in the interests of my own responsibilities to a child. B.F. Skinner and others have speculated on the possibilities of raising ALL children without special parents, and others have experimented with communal parenting models that don't tie one's life to the parents one can't choose.

I don't think we should be unhappy our governments and societies provide supports to children with no parents, or parents who can't provide a decent life for them. Marriage evolved in large part as a way to free people from supporting children who aren't their own, and in parts of the world where men don't traditionally support their offspring (like large parts of sub-Saharan Africa) population control is difficult to impossible.

ASERICO:

It's true that inequality worsens the resource distribution problem, but not the resource exhaustion problem. Whatever our population level and standard of living, and whatever we do to catch up with all the environmental problems from climate change to agricultural contamination, we can be certain that there is some level at which the human population is not sustainable. And that no program hoping to deal with the population we have will succeed before it is obsoleted by the growth of population.

There's little to be gained in fighting to redistribute wealth or reduce our standard of living in an attempt to reduce inequality and environmental degradation when population grows both exponentially (as it naturally does, given how human breeding chain reactions work) and without limit.

And, of course, if we DO manage to limit population, we can hope that technological and social progress will enable us to all live decent lives without trampling on others.

In an ironic twist, this planet would be better off with a lot fewer people and a lot more cars. Cars don't create more cars.ED BEAR

1. For anyone wondering about "cleaning up after," and who enjoys really fine cinema about the great existential questions of life, I recommend Kore-Eda's AIR DOLL. You'll need to be able to read subtitles and watch at the same time, though, as its in Japanese. It stars the amazing Korean actor Doo-na Bae (assorted spellings appear) also seen in LINDA LINDA LINDA and HOST (the Korean one of that name).

At the start of the film, our heroine is living with her owner, a sad and unimaginative dude who bought her to avoid having to deal with real people - and not just for sex; he lives with her and shares meals as one would with a partner. Anyway, the above question is quickly addressed.

2. In San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge is the site of an unofficial "passenger-sharing" site. There's a corner on the north side where people line up to await rides from SF-bound commuters who don't want to pay the outrageous toll. Since HOVs get a break, there are lots of drivers who pick up passengers to drop off in town, and deliver others back on the way home.

No harm, no foul. :)

3. A big part of the history of the creation of marriage is that there are plenty of people looking for sex but not wanting to raise children. Thus, a contract was created to ensure they did, and a lot of mythology about what True Love should be.

Today, we don't need an endless supply of babies, as they are the principal cause of all environmental problems. Both men and women (with the aid of contraception, abortion and equal employment - not perfect yet, but at least accepted and available) can choose the role they want, and what they may want other people to play in theirs. It's really important that people make a deal that they and any partners are both happy with.

Social scientists are doing a lot of work on the alienation of males and females - most strikingly in Taiwan and Japan, but also elsewhere. In Taiwan, there is so little confidence in the future of the country at the hands of China that the traditional family bonds and multi-generational goals are being replaced with planning to get the heck outta here instead of building families.

In Japan, the pop culture trend is for men and women to not feel they need each other; the women only want cars, money and clothing, and employment to let them get what they want. The men, we are told, only want mechanical sex and video games, ideally without any need to work or clean up.

These generalizations obviously aren't universal truths, but they are widely enough discussed that one has to think seriously about what people who don't have to go beyond their own desires will do with their lives.

In China, the softening of the One Child policy surprised the Party bosses - there don't seem to be a lot of people in the cites who want more than one child; the focus is still on having one MALE child, but not in having any others. Or any females.

In the light of these trends, we do have to ask the Fembots and Magic Wands are saying about our world. Meanwhile, huge numbers of people exercise their self-indulgence by arrogating control of the world with their own self-serving versions of What's Right for the World. Hrumph.

ED BEAR

Remember all those, "Why is Beer/A Motorcycle/A Vibrator better than a Woman/Man" lists? We all need to think about what we want in our lives, and not accept packages others impose.

Dee, I think that mobster you refer to as being busted for tax evasion must be Al Capone. The Feds got his accountant to turn over his files.

As for fact-checking Trump's acceptance speech - much of what he said was simply cherry-picking and deliberately misleading. Like choosing homicide stats from only the largest 50 cities in the US - and in fact for a time period where there are not statistics yet, so he's going on a partial analysis that is a journalist's effort to predict what we don't know yet.

I was particularly disturbed by his assertion that he would fight to protect LGBTQ persons from foreign ideologies of hate. Leaving plenty of room for American ideologies of hate, of course.

The US does not have one of the highest tax rates in the world - though Trump makes his wealthy pals feel that way. Many a right-wing politico has pointed to high MARGINAL tax rates as high while AVERAGE tax rates are low... but even that isn't true here. And few wealthy individuals or businesses pay the full marginal rate, if any; they have the resources to use the help-the-rich provisions of conservative tax codes.

In a number of his claims, he picks his time scales carefully or mis-states them. Often what he attributed to the Obama era mostly occured, or started, with Bush. Other times, he excludes recent years when progress has been strongest - though in the case of the 50-biggest-cities homicide stats, he uses only a projection for the current year.

One doesn't have to lie to mislead. In fact, one doesn't even have to accuse someone of lying to get tossed out of the Canadian parliament for a day; "deliberately misleading" is close enough. (This last sentence is humor and social context, not any sort of smoking gun.)ED BEAR